RRND Email Full Text (Scheduled)

  • UK: Farage triggers by-election amid donations probe

    Source: Politico

    “Nigel Farage resigned as an MP Tuesday to trigger a by-election amid intense scrutiny of his financial arrangements. … Farage is being investigated by Parliamentary Commissioner for Standards Daniel Greenberg over whether he broke House of Commons rules by failing to declare a £5 million donation from crypto billionaire Christopher Harborne. Farage has repeatedly said he was under no obligation to declare the gift because he received it before he was elected as Clacton MP. He said Tuesday he is also being investigated over fresh accusations he failed to declare gifts and donations from crypto entrepreneur George Cottrell.” (07/07/26)

    https://www.politico.eu/article/nigel-farage-triggers-by-election-amid-donations-probe

  • France: Le Pen says she will run for president after court shortens ban on holding office

    Source: Reuters

    “French far-right leader Marine Le Pen announced that she will run for president in 2027. Le Pen made the announcement during a prime-time TV interview, hours after an appeals court shortened her ban on holding public office. Her presidential hopes had been in limbo since March 2025, when she received the five-year ban for using money from the European Parliament to pay wages for staff at her anti-immigrant National Rally (RN) party in France. The appeals court in Paris upheld her conviction but significantly shortened the ban, so that in effect it is already over. However, the court said she would need to wear an electronic monitoring bracelet for a year. Le Pen said she would appeal against the ruling to France’s highest court, the Cour de Cassation. That would suspend her sentence and the order to wear the tag until the court delivers its own decision, allowing her to campaign freely, she said.” (07/07/26)

    https://www.reuters.com/world/marine-le-pen-verdict-live-frances-far-right-leader-awaits-appeal-ruling-with-2026-07-07/

  • UT: Regime revokes license for boarding school where Paris Hilton says she was abused as a teen

    Source: Seattle Times

    “The state of Utah has revoked the license of a boarding school where socialite Paris Hilton said she was abused as a teenager, saying the school has ‘failed to provide applicable health and safety services for clients.’ The state’s action, which took effect Monday, cites multiple noncompliance issues against the Provo Canyon School’s campus in Springville. The school has 15 days to request a hearing before the Department of Health & Human Services. … ‘For more than fifty years, children came forward with stories of abuse, neglect, and trauma,’ Hilton said in a statement provided Tuesday. ‘Today, the state confirmed what survivors have known all along: Provo Canyon School failed the children in its care. I was one of those children.’ … She alleges staff members beat her, watched her shower, fed her unknown pills and locked her in solitary confinement without clothing.” (07/07/26)

    https://archive.is/c8rWK

  • NATO picks Swedish Saab early-warning planes over US rival

    Source: Reuters

    “NATO announced a roughly $4.5 billion plan on Tuesday to buy up to 10 ‌Saab GlobalEye surveillance planes to replace ageing AWACS early warning aircraft, backing a Swedish system over a rival solution from U.S. planemaker Boeing. Secretary-General Mark Rutte said the replacement of Cold War-era Airborne Warning and Control System (AWACS) planes, best known for their rotating radomes, ​with a new system based on smaller business jets would tackle threats like drone swarms. … With U.S. President Donald Trump repeatedly pressing allies to ​spend more on defence and buy more U.S. equipment, Rutte took pains to underline the international pedigree of the ​system which is mounted on top of Bombardier Global 6500 business jets. … GlobalEye competes with Boeing’s E-7 Wedgetail, an early warning ‌and command-and-control ⁠aircraft based on the 737 jetliner and designed to oversee and direct battle.” (07/07/26)

    https://www.reuters.com/business/aerospace-defense/nato-picks-swedish-saab-early-warning-planes-over-us-rival-2026-07-07/

  • Poll: US support for Israel slips as Democrats grow more critical

    Source: Seattle Times

    “After decades of reliable bipartisan backing for Israel, a new AP-NORC poll reveals a dramatic erosion of support for the longtime U.S. ally, with rising opposition from Democrats and signs of division among Republicans. The survey by The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research arrives at a moment when a once-consensus foreign policy issue is increasingly polarizing Americans along partisan and generational lines, driven by criticism for Israel’s conduct nearly three years after the outbreak of its latest war with Hamas in Gaza. About one-third of U.S. adults — including roughly half of Democrats — believe that Israel has committed genocide against Palestinians during the war in Gaza …. About 58% of Democrats now say the U.S. is ‘too supportive’ of the Israelis, up from 45% in an AP-NORC poll from January 2024 when former President Joe Biden was in office. That includes 51% of Jewish Democrats in the new poll.” (07/07/26)

    https://archive.is/IWoxk


  • Let’s Leave the Strait of Hormuz Alone

    Source: Antiwar.com
    by Ron Paul

    “[P]erhaps the most destructive ‘own-goal’ of the US attack is the Iranian decision to establish control over the Strait of Hormuz. Even in the US/Israeli attacks of last June, the Strait was kept open by Iran. It is a vital trade route and in everyone’s best interest to keep open for business. The February attack and Iran’s strong regional response led the country to embrace what some have called a de facto nuclear weapon: control of the Strait. … It is in the best interest of the United States to abandon claims on Hormuz – which is thousands of miles away – and live with the consequences of Trump’s mistake.” (07/07/26)

    https://original.antiwar.com/paul/2026/07/06/lets-leave-the-strait-of-hormuz-alone

  • Politics is Just Another Word for No Freedom Left to Choose

    Source: Garrison Center
    by Joel Schlosberg

    “Big business versus big government is the ultimate false dichotomy of our time. Championing the former won’t break the cycle that allows both to marginalize the scope of (and solutions emerging from) voluntary cooperation, decentralized association, and individual freedom.” (07/07/26)

    https://thegarrisoncenter.org/archives/20727

  • Billionaire Welfare Queens and Their Sycophants

    Source: Libertarian Institute
    by Thomas Eddlem

    “Elon Musk has taken in at least $38 billion in subsidies and federal contracts, not counting the $1.5 billion EV subsidy Tesla took advantage of from President Barack Obama’s 2009 American Recovery and Reinvestment Act. The ARRA gave a $7,500 per vehicle subsidy to electric vehicle purchases. In total, that $39.5 billion in subsidies amounts to $470 for every one of the 84.2 million American families. That means the average family is $470 poorer because of Elon Musk. Billionaire and trillionaire sycophants counter that Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos, Sergey Brin and the other super-wealthy provide services to the American government, that these services are ‘worth it,’ and that if they hadn’t provided the services or taken the subsidies someone else would have. … [That] sounds a lot like an argument a leftist greenie and a loyalist of the military-industrial complex would make, respectively.” (07/07/26)

    https://libertarianinstitute.org/articles/billionaire-welfare-queens-and-their-sycophants

  • People Used to Control Machines. They Don’t Anymore

    Source: Wired
    by Ian Bogost

    “If gratification is so easy, why don’t you feel more gratified already? Because it’s gotten harder. It’s still easy to experience individual feats of gratification when you find them (or they find you). But the ordinary circumstances that once produced so much gratification have gradually receded. Unseen choices in design, business, and social life have made it harder for you to engage directly with the sensory world. This problem snuck up on me, and probably on you as well. Slowly, over time, the world started withdrawing from us. Automation took over ordinary tasks. Things that used to have buttons suddenly did not. Basic activities got taken over by computers. I was slow to notice it happening, too. But once I did, I saw it everywhere and every day.” (07/07/26)

    https://archive.is/ivBfr

  • Democracy has a participation problem. AI may help solve it.

    Source: Foundation for Individual Rights and Education
    by Chloe Ratner

    “While discussions about AI often focus on misinformation and transparency, these concerns miss the bigger picture. The question is no longer whether AI should shape democratic processes — it already does — but how it can be channeled to promote free speech and democracy with imperfect tools. Generative AI has become a hot debate topic in the world of First Amendment rights and free speech. Questions about how to classify AI-generated content, what protections it does or does not deserve, and who bears liability for its outputs represent genuine legal and ethical frontiers. But amid these legal and ethical debates, a fundamental capability of AI gets lost in the noise: its ability to sort, organize, and amplify human speech rather than replace it.” (07/08/25)

    https://www.fire.org/news/democracy-has-participation-problem-ai-may-help-solve-it

  • Mamdani’s Embittered Fourth of July Rant to America

    Source: American Greatness
    by Victor Davis Hanson

    “Zohran Mamdani, New York’s self-described socialist mayor, could not resist using the nation’s 250th anniversary celebration to trash the very country that he and his parents voluntarily sought out. As is his custom, Mamdani speaks in stereotypes and generalities, offering few if any examples, all laced with his accustomed unctuous hypocrisy. … At every moment in our past, those who led through exclusion and isolation have tried to win power and enrich themselves by turning us against one another. Thus spoke the pampered rich kid from Uganda, who immigrated to America with his now-endowed professor father and elite filmmaker mother, the latter reportedly supported by millions of dollars in grants from the Qatari royal autocracy.” (07/07/26)

    https://amgreatness.com/2026/07/07/mamdanis-embittered-fourth-of-july-rant-to-america/

  • Rewarding Good Governance: How Foot-Voters Benefit Society

    Source: The Daily Economy
    by Emile Phaneuf III

    “Governance improves when people and businesses are free to leave high-tax, low-value jurisdictions. Competition can improve public policy just as it improves products and services.” (07/07/26)

    https://thedailyeconomy.org/article/rewarding-good-governance-how-foot-voters-benefit-society/

  • Return-to-office mandates are a pay cut in disguise

    Source: The Hill
    by Gleb Tsipursky

    “Return-to-office is a compensation decision that hits wallets first and morale soon after. If leaders want people in seats, the fair move is simple: cover the costs or raise the pay. When workers go to the office, they pay to work. The typical in-office day now runs roughly $15 for the commute, $9 for parking, $13 for breakfast or coffee, and $18 for lunch, all detailed in the 2025 Owl Labs report.” [editor’s note: While I agree that it’s a pay cut, if you’re spending $13 for breakfast/coffee and $18 for lunch on a daily basis, I suggest Googling terms like “lunch box” and “insulated mug” – TLK] (07/07/26)

    https://thehill.com/opinion/technology/5955528-office-commute-costs-employees/

  • Today In Dystopia

    Source: Caitlin Johnstone, Rogue Journalist
    by Caitlin Johnstone

    “Today in dystopia Americans are becoming increasingly outraged by the ubiquity of Flock’s AI-assisted surveillance cameras throughout US cities. Flock officers getting caught in lies and viral video footage of police abusing their access to the technology have contributed to the outcry, with public vandalism of the cameras taking place with increasing frequency in public spaces. Today in dystopia the German government is moving to ban workers from calling in sick by phone in order to boost the economy by reducing the amount of sick leave being taken by corporate employees. New regulations would require a certified in-person doctor’s visit on the very first day of sick leave. They’re just coming right out and saying that the public exists to serve the corporations now. Today in dystopia we’re starting to see videos of quadrupedal robots firing guns with accuracy and minimal recoil.” (07/07/26)

    https://caitlinjohnstone.com.au/2026/07/07/today-in-dystopia/

  • Freedom Versus the Income Tax

    Source: Future of Freedom Foundation
    by Jacob G Hornberger

    “[F]or more than 100 years, Americans were free to keep everything they earned — 100 percent — and there was nothing that U.S. officials could do about. That’s what it once meant to be an American. That’s what it once meant to be free. By the time the late 1800s came along, the standard of living of the American people was skyrocketing. A big reason for that phenomenon was that there had been no income tax for almost 100 years.” (07/07/26)

    https://www.fff.org/2026/07/07/freedom-versus-the-income-tax/

  • Memo to Trump: Don’t go wobbly on Ukraine at the NATO summit

    Source: New York Post
    by staff

    “As President Donald Trump prepares to take center stage at the NATO summit in Ankara, he must place the robust defense of Ukraine at the absolute top of the agenda. Whatever he does — whatever his current irritations — he must not look to throw Kyiv under the bus. Rather, with Russian strongman Vladimir Putin still baring his gritted teeth, Trump must communicate to his counterparts in the great North Atlantic security alliance the necessity of holding the line, ramping up pressure on Moscow and bolstering its defensive posture on the eastern frontier. Russian aggression is Europe’s generational security challenge (and down the road, potentially America’s, too); it demands to be top-of-mind for every leader in the alliance. Anything less would signal weakness to Putin and embolden adversaries from Beijing to Tehran.” (07/06/26)

    https://nypost.com/2026/07/06/opinion/memo-to-trump-dont-go-wobbly-on-ukraine-at-the-nato-summit/

  • A Mutual Sympathy of Sentiments

    Source: EconLog
    by Art Carden

    “In The Theory of Moral Sentiments, Adam Smith explains that we want to establish a ‘mutual sympathy of sentiments.’ We want people to agree with our views, and we want to agree with their views. Smith first expanded on this idea … before he developed his broader theory of a commercial society in An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations. The implications were astounding: a complex division of labor and division of knowledge, and the kind of prosperity we see today. That’s what every bid and ask in a market is: a request to cooperate through mutual sympathy with another person. It can be plainly rejected by someone who doesn’t share similar sentiments, but every opportunity to exchange is a sacred opportunity to work together with someone to mutual advantage.” (07/07/26)

    https://www.econlib.org/econlog/a-mutual-sympathy-of-sentiments

  • A Military Flyover Country Turns 250

    Source: Common Dreams
    by Bita Iuliano & Olivia Dinucci

    “As the country and this administration launched its America 250 and Freedom 250 ‘Celebrations’ over the holiday weekend, what we experienced in the nation’s capitol and a city of 700,000 residents replicated what the United States does to other parts of the world. The streets were invaded by the military, public spaces barricaded with multiple levels of security checkpoints, and the sky full of military flyovers, including a seven-hour schedule of flyovers on July 4th. Military flyovers come at a devastating cost—economically, psychologically, and environmentally. The most recent ones came in the middle of a heatwave where even Trump’s American State Fair closed after people were baptizing themselves in the religious tent to prevent heat stroke. But flyovers are not new and have been used as a propaganda tool for military recruitment during NFL games and summer festivals. The militarization has been so normalized for so long.” (07/06/26)

    https://www.commondreams.org/opinion/patriotic-flyovers

  • Why Does the Earth Need More Fences to Stay Green?

    Source: Students For Liberty
    by Ketevani Kadagishvili

    “Walk down any residential street and you will notice a curious, common pattern. A homeowner’s private garden is often a well-tended space filled with blooming flowers and vibrant life. In contrast, the public park we share is frequently damaged by litter, ruined grass, and broken benches. Why does this difference exist? The answer lies in the deep connection between ownership and care, a principle that Frédéric Bastiat understood nearly two centuries ago.” (07/07/26)

    https://studentsforliberty.org/blog/why-does-the-earth-need-more-fences-to-stay-green/

  • Why Are Millionaires Leaving the UK?

    Source: Foundation for Economic Education
    by Mani Basharzad

    “Samuel Johnson once wrote that ‘when a man is tired of London, he is tired of life.’ Today, however, there seems to be one group that is tired of London: millionaires.” (07/07/26)

    https://fee.org/articles/why-are-millionaires-leaving-the-uk/

  • Chatrie and the Long and Winding Road to Privacy

    Source: Law & Liberty
    by Amy Peikoff

    “A Supreme Court ruling on cell phone location data may signal a deeper shift in how courts define privacy under the Fourth Amendment.” (07/07/26)

    https://lawliberty.org/chatrie-and-the-long-and-winding-road-to-privacy/